Now for a bit of engine work! I mocked-up the headers to see how they were gonna look, not too bad!

I spent the rest of last night getting the wiring started. Adding a photo-etched wire loom to these Fatkidd distributors is fun, I don't know how Paul makes 'em, but getting that boot back on after adding the PE piece is a blast!

Oh, and the starter is in place...it's also drilled for a bit of wiring when the time comes!

I finally got some Primer/Sealer on the boat. I'll let it cure for a few days, and see if I have any problem areas to address. Right now I can see a slight run at the top of the dash, but that's a minor issue, everything else is looking good!

Well, I sanded down the boat a bit more, applied a bit more putty to a few tiny issues, and decided to tackle the ill-fitting hood on the truck. After trying to get it to fit right, I ended up screwing it up with hot water....

So I went out and grabbed a second truck kit to steal the hood from. Since I'm going to get another kit, I figured I could hack the bed up a bit and really get it looking right...

Yup, I'm going to really make the bed look good, it's gonna look like it should now...wood bed floor and all! This baby is gonna look like I want it to, whether it likes it or not!

I attacked the unmolested bed....it's no longer unmolested, that's for sure! I started by cutting the fenders off as close to the bed as I could get without actually messing up the bed sides...

Next, I cut the bed floor loose from the back edge of the bed very carefully. The plan is to leave the rear piece attached, let's see if I can pull it off! This was all done using the Trumpeter Panel Scriber...much better control and a smoother line!

The same was done at the front of the bed, but I finished this cut off with a PE Saw Blade...it was way thicker here!

Next up was starting the cuts on the sides of the bed to remove the floor so it can be replaced with some Basswood. I stopped before cutting them loose because I realized I was going to need the structure to have some strength while sanding on the outsides...for once, I actually thought ahead more than 5 minutes!

Since I'm also correcting the top of the bed sides, I decided to cut them off. But, in another example of thinking ahead for once, I decided to just cut them flush with the bed sides to make the "fix" for the horribly molded garbage easier to pull off! Like with the fenders, I left a bit attached to the bed. Yeah, it's gonna be tedious sanding it all smooth, but it's better than adding a bunch of unnecessary filler!

I started the long process of sanding the side of the bed smooth. Here's where I the horribly bad "bulging" top rails on the bed weren't the only issue. The sides of the bed are just as bad as the tops! So once the sides are smoothed out, I'll remove the bed floor, and smooth out the insides too. This kit has some serious issues with the tooling for sure!

Round one completed. There's a nasty dip at the back edge where the fender goes...good thing the fender will be right up against it, so it won't even be noticeable once it's all back together!

Round two showed a bit more sanding was still needed at the top center area...

Round three, all is good on this side of the bed! I'll hit it with some 600, 800 and 1500 grit and see how it looks.

And a quick shot from above to show how the side looks so far! This took about two hours total

Back to the boat for a second, I discovered that the prop-shaft should have been glued in place when the two sides of the hull were glued together. I guess that piece of paper in the bottom of the box comes in handy sometimes, doesn't it? It worked out through, since the hole that it passed through was all kinds of messed up, I could get it corrected now! I snipped the prop-shaft in half at the point that it passes through the hull, so it'll work fine. I also got the hole tightened up, so now it doesn't look like the boat would sink if it actually hit the water!

So looking at the diagram for Open Cooling system, I'll need a water pump, thermostat above it, and a line for the water from the back of the boat. Then a couple of lines from the thermostat housing to the headers. I've got some stuff to make, this has bugged me for a while now!

Now where am I gonna be able to put the lines to those funky headers? Maybe I can add some more to the flanges and run it there?

BTW, I'm planning on using the Open Cooling system just to make it easier, with one small modification because of the headers. After all the work I did to make 'em look right, I'm going to eliminate the risers because I don't want to ruin the look of the headers. But I will be trying to find a way to get the lines from the thermostat housing to the lower side of the headers at least, I'm still trying to figure that part out!

Thanks Wayne, since the engine for the boat is fully visible, I want it to look better than what came in the box!

OK, here's the pics of what I made to pass for a thermostat housing. I started with a styrene tube, opened it up enough for the braided line to fit in, and took a notch out of the center so I could make it angled to get around the heads. Then I grabbed a piece of parts tree and made the thermostat housing section of it. A bit of glue for the notched section, and a bit of sanding, and we have a roughed-in thermostat housing and attachment for the braided lines, probably not 100% accurate, but it'll look good enough for me!

finishing off the prep work for the new bed floor. The fun part about the new bed is going to be the four attachment "stubs", I'm still trying to figure out how I'm going to get those on the basswood bed floor...

I put the original bed floor back in place and marked where it sits so I can add some angle strip to retain the new basswood floor.

Next, a quick mock-up with two strips of basswood. It's going to be the same thickness as the original plastic bed floor, talk about lucky!

I got the plate for the water intake made up, and set up the goat and flooring insert for the intake pipe. I used a piece of thin brass I got out of an alarm panel to make the plate, and spent a ton of time trying to get the hole just right for the pipe to fit properly. Here's the pics, enjoy!

It took two tries to get the hole in the brass just right, this was fun!

The plate in it's proposed spot on the hull....

I marked around the plate, and marked the hole so I could drill the hull for the intake pipe...

The hardest part was getting the angle of the hole right so the intake pipe would sit the way I wanted once it gets glued in place. This took about as long as getting the hole right in the brass sheet!

Here's the screen I'm going to use on the end of the intake tube...well, actually on the plate, since it's easier to attach it to the plate than the tube!

Yeah, that's some seriously fine mesh!

A tiny piece was cut, and applied to the backside of the plate...

Extreme close-up anyone?

Once the superglue dried, I sanded the plate down and polished it up, I'm still not sure if I'm going to leave it brass, or paint it with some Metalizer Stainless Steel, we'll see how it looks once the boat is painted.

The next step was to get the area the intake plate will go recessed. I cut a piece of the brass to match the intake plate, laid it in the hole and covered it with filler. Once it cures, I'll sand it smooth and pop the plate free, the see if my actual plate fits!

I sanded the filler down and popped the brass filler piece out, cleaned up the opening a bit, then laid the actual intake plate in place, and added a bit more filler to cover the gaps along the edges. I should be able to sand this down tomorrow night and hopefully be done with this part!

The next few posts are all about the wonderful hood in this kit. Having ruined the first one, I took a slow, deliberate approach to the second hood. I stated by gluing the sides to the hood first this time, making sure they lined up with the cab. Once they had set for a week and I was sure they were not going to move, I set the front piece in place and glued it down to match the lines on the top of the hood, not really worrying about the sides. Once the glue had set, I had a nasty gap on each side where it meets the lower front, but it sits perfectly on the cab, so now I needed to fix the gaps. A bit of strip styrene was glued into the gap to fill the holes, so far, it still fits!

In this last pic, you can see the mismatch between the sides and front piece, that's gonna be fun to get straight! But it fits, so I can fix any other issues at this point, it's only plastic!